My Father's Daughter
by BlindAssassinUK
Summary: Post episode 4x15 and canon divergent. After the trauma of the shooting, the reveal of Oliver's lie and the recent run-in with her father, Felicity decides to treat herself to some much needed rest and relaxation. But the past won't let her be. A story about finding your way back.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One**

She is the type of person whose instinct, no matter the pain she's feeling, is always to comfort someone in distress. She doesn't see this as a weakness because it isn't, she can look after herself. Only this time, _this_ time, she's struggling to focus on anything other than her own hurt and anger, which runs through her, snatching and clawing at her sides before it climbs into her chest, nestling there; its weight, its blunt impact, affecting her ability to breathe evenly.

Everything. Hurts.

He looks stunned, like a man who grasps wildly for a hand to save him at the moment he loses his footing on the edge of a rooftop, only to realise as he hurtles downwards that he is all on his own, and that he will not be saved. He'd said goodbye to his son. Nothing could break that fall.

He notices her then and asks how much of his message she's heard. She tells him that she heard enough. His response is to let go of a painful sigh that she guesses he's been holding onto since that night she found out about William. His shoulders sag, something they rarely do, and she can tell that he's barely holding it together. She wants so badly reach out to him but she's all too aware of the closed laptop between them and of the decision he just made. Another life altering decision that he has chosen to make without including her. And so she tells him that they need to talk.

"About a number of things, I suspect," he says wearily.

As she moves closer, she's already imaging how much it will hurt her to slide the ring off her finger, but as soon as she's level with the large dining table, she does it.

"Let's start with…" She turns the ring over once in her fingers before placing it on the table. "…I can't do this."

She meets his eye as she explains how for the sake of his son she tabled how she was feeling about everything, but that now, _now_ , she needs space. He whispers her name as a plea, and as much as she wants to try to understand, to forgive and to be the person he knows she is, she can't. She can't be that person for him, for them, anymore. Something has shifted inside her and she can't do anything but protect herself and watch him unravel some more. And so she continues, she tells him that she knows Samantha placed him in an impossible position, but that he was right – he should have told her.

"Marriage is about inclusion. It's about leaning on your partner when things get complicated. I don't think you know how to do that."

It's when he reaches for his next words, when he forces them into his mouth after summoning them from some place she has never been able to touch that she discerns some other emotion once lurking but now starting to take shape in the set of his jaw and the lost look that softens the blue of his eyes. Eyes that now won't meet hers.

"I'm trying."

But she knows this is not enough. How could it be? Not after everything they've been through. And she knows in that moment what he's thinking – _if not now, then one day._ She knows that when she leaves him that there will be some part of Oliver that will be relieved. He never stopped waiting for the ground to fall away from under him, at least now he could stop anticipating the reason for the inevitable descent and just concentrate on surviving the landing.

"And now you're sending William away. And I understand why, you know that I do, but once again you have left me out of the decision."

As the last of these words leave her lips, the muscles in her left thigh spasm and she can feel a dull ache in her hip. In an instant, pins and needles run down her shin until they reach her left foot, which jerks forwards against the footrest of the wheelchair. She cannot believe what she is seeing and feeling. Fear and joy mingle in her chest and it's too much to feel all at once. He says something, it might have been her name, but she can't concentrate on that – she has to know. She has to try to get up, despite being more afraid than she's been since their limo was shot through with a million bullets. Still looking down, she takes a deep breath and places her hands on the side of the wheelchair and slowly pushes upwards, supporting her weight. She doesn't really believe what she is seeing; instead she trusts the way it feels as her foot makes contact with the floor. She can feel the leather encasing her foot; she can feel the way her toes are thrust forward because of the heel of the boot, and she can feel the pressure exerted on the balls of her foot as she continues to push herself upright. Her right foot feels slightly numb, but as soon as she is standing, the numbness disappears.

" _Oh my god."_ His exclamation dovetails her own and it's then that she looks at him. He looks back up at her, his mouth slightly open in wonder, and she wants nothing more than to reach for him then, to hold him and be held, to share this joy, but she won't do it. This time she breaks eye contact and slowly turns away from him. Touching one of the supporting beams to momentarily steady herself, she slowly and, still disbelievingly, walks to the front door. She doesn't look back because she knows if she does it will give him hope that she doesn't have to spare.

The practised click of the loft door almost covers the sound of the shaky breath she lets out. She has walked maybe ten steps in total and is completely exhausted. The elevator looks so far away. She rests, breathes, and rests some more before moving again. In the end, it's the fear that Oliver will leave the loft to come look for her that motivates her to walk the final few steps and hit the button to call the elevator. It arrives just in time. Stumbling inside, she bursts into tears that start off happy because she can walk again but which quickly turn angry and painfully desperate.

Because _of course_ it was about the lie. Not his son. It was the months of being so close to him that she felt him everywhere she went. It was the broad, open smile that lit his eyes and softened his all-too present frown when she told him about her day overseeing Palmer Tech. It was the slow-kissing mornings and the urgent wonderful nights. It was the ring that felt at home on her finger. It was the way he carried her to bed. It was his patience. It was his belief in her. It was the way he delighted in discovering any new tiny thing about her. It was the way he marvelled at all the ways she loved him.

It was _them_. It was working. It was.

But now it was all about the LIE and what it signified. This poisonous thing that tore through what they shared, because if he couldn't share this truth with her then, despite everything, he didn't trust her. He wouldn't or couldn't lean on her when he needed her the most and knowing that was what convinced her that she needed to put space between them. He had seen her at her lowest. She hadn't hidden what she had become after the shooting. And when her father blew into town, only to disappoint her all over again, she had shared her pain with Oliver. He had seen her raw, vulnerable and bewildered, but he was not prepared to let her see him the same way.

Taking in a steadying breath as the elevator comes to a stop, she mentally tries to prepare herself for the walk across the lobby to the large glass entranceway. She makes it outside of the apartment building in twenty-three slow steps but finds that the street is full of people all moving much quicker than her and so she flattens herself against the wall and reaches inside her coat pocket for her ever-present cell phone, to call for a ride - traversing the lobby was one thing, walking ten blocks over to Palmer Tech is quite another. As her fingers close around the slim rectangle in her pocket, she pauses for a moment and tilts her face toward the late afternoon sun and, despite her whole body aching with the effort of simply standing again, the light and warmth energise her. She needs this. She needs to feel warm inside and out. She needs the light. She needs to be some place else.

~O~

He understands pain. He understands helplessness. He knows what these two things combined feel like. But as he sits at the table in their home, alone, he knows what sounds in his head and his heart is something worse. It is desperation, and he knows it will be endless. He won't move or maybe it's that he can't and so he continues to stare at the closed door; tears falling steadily now, hands fisted so hard that the resulting tension shoots needles of pain into his elbows, and desperation fills him up. He doesn't want to survive her; because he knows what will be left of him after won't be worth holding onto.

There had been no point reaching for her while she was still within touching distance, but still, his fingers ached all the same. There was no point rehashing the ashamedly few words that fell from his lips and wondering if he ought to have chosen better ones. Just as there was no point looking for where he'd gone wrong because he knew. The lie. The lie he'd told months ago and clung to even though all he wanted to do was rid himself of its burden. The lie was how he broke her heart and put tears in her eyes. The lie was how he lost her.

As the minutes then hours tick by, his thoughts, as they so often do, turn to Lian Yu. He wishes he were there, miles and miles from another living soul. He understands that kind of alone. This is something new. Something else. He looks away from the door at all the empty space she has left behind. Everything looks wrong. Everything looks too bright. He finally gets up from the chair, his lower back and the muscles in his legs protesting at this new shape he's formed, and walks over to the wall of glass that affords a million-dollar view of Star City. He looks at the buildings opposite and those that occupy the distance and imagines all the people inside. How is he going to do this without her? Catching a glimpse of his reflection in the glass, he immediately spins back around and makes for the door. He pulls on the handle so hard that the aluminium doorframe groans. Kicking the door shut behind him, he runs for the stairs and races down the twenty flights, desperate to feel the night on his skin and desperate for the darkness, so he can hide.

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 _ **Thanks to ProfJMarie for her beta help. And thanks for reading.**_


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Thank you for reading and reviewing! Big thanks to ProfJMarie for her help with this chapter...boy, I needed it.**

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Chapter Two

Not going home to her was a special kind of torture. He was used to his body aching at the end of a night fighting whatever version of darkness awaited him in the shadows of his city, but nothing could have prepared him for the loneliness and the physical toll that it exacted. It dogged him as he slid one-handed down zip-lines he'd anchored in concrete walls and he felt its weight when he snapped each arrow into position and then released them into flesh and bone. It wasn't getting better. He didn't miss her any less. She was his first thought upon waking, his last before falling asleep and when he inevitably woke during the night, he reached his hand across the cool sheets and allowed himself to believe she was still there next to him. Sometimes it worked and he'd fall back to sleep, happy in his delusion, but more often he stared up at the ceiling and listened to the in-and-out of his every breath until the sun rose.

Years spent sleeping at the mercy of the elements, on mud, on branches, on cold and unforgiving concrete floors, on flea-infested camp beds and still, when he finally made it home after those five years and climbed into his own bed, he knew he wasn't home. He didn't know what home meant to him after all he'd seen and done, until he recognised in it Felicity. And honestly, long before they became what he'd now lost, she was home to him. Home was in the way she smiled at him, which usually never failed to influence the arrangement of his own lips, the way she would instinctively nudge him out of her way when he got too close to her bank of computers, the way she chewed on one of the many colourful pens she kept in plentiful supply as he powered his way up the salmon ladder, never hiding the fact that she liked to watch. And without her, without her as his home, he was truly lost.

Oliver sometimes caught Diggle staring at him, since Felicity had left the team, and he caught the disappointment cast on his friend's otherwise usually workmanlike expression. In those moments Oliver kept his own head down, his face turned away from judgment. He was more than grateful that Diggle had so far had the good grace and sense enough to keep his thoughts to himself because the last thing he wanted was for the error of his ways to be placed before him by a man who understood just what those errors meant to him. Oliver wasn't blind; he knew Diggle and Felicity shared a bond that was quite distinct from him. Theirs was a friendship forged in the dark and isolating secrecy of the foundry, but which easily flourished once they made it above ground. They were family, the three of them. And while Oliver knew that John loved them both, he'd never doubt that Felicity and Diggle were better friends to one another.

He ground to a stop on the edge of a rooftop. Standing tall out of habit, he surveyed the streets below and willed the cacophonic noise of a still-awake city to drown out the memory of her words, words which were spoken long ago but which kept rolling around in his head: _"I don't want to be a woman that you love."_ She was a woman he loved, a woman who knew better, but had trusted him anyway. He never deserved it.

"Boss, we done here?"

Oliver tapped the sensor on his chest and replied in the affirmative. "I'll hand these guys over to Captain Lance on my way back. All quiet here now. Go home, Spartan."

"Will do. Spartan, out."

It had been a quiet week, which was exactly what he didn't need. Now that Darhk was off the streets, the ghosts had dissolved into the shadows and Star City breathed freely again. He should be pleased, but he was spoiling for a fight, for a punishing flurry of fists and kicks, anything but this stillness. He'd been on patrol alone for the past few nights because things were so quiet that he'd told Thea and Laurel to stay home and take a much needed rest. Diggle had manned the comms because his friend had refused to let Oliver operate completely on his own, but that had been the worst part. Every time he heard the split-second crackle before a voice sounded in his ear, he stupidly held his breath, waiting for it to be hers.

He had no idea where she was. But he knew where she wasn't. He'd checked in at Palmer Tech; she hadn't been there all week. And she wasn't with Donna. Thea and Laurel hadn't heard from her and he was pretty confident that they'd tell him if they had. And unless Dig was lying to him, neither he nor Lyla knew where she was. Felicity had withdrawn $10,000 from her bank account the night she'd walked out of the loft but since then, they'd been no activity on any of her cards. She hadn't used public transport or taken a cab after taking the one that had dropped her at Palmer Tech that same evening. Every time he got a moment to himself, he sat and tried to make her computers do what he needed them to do. Hour after hour and nothing, and all the while he knew that this made him even more of an asshole, because the least he could do was give her space. He'd tried lying to himself, rationalising that this intrusion into her life was necessary in order to keep her safe, but he knew it was also because he just wanted to see her again.

Oliver stepped back from the edge of the roof and sighed, a rueful smile playing on his lips, because the irony was not lost on him – the only person who could find Felicity was Felicity herself.

~O~

The warm evening winds swept towards her, carried on the peaks of the endless slow-lapping waves. She felt the late-afternoon sun caress her bikini-clad skin and the slight breeze flicked her hair lightly against her cheek. She was surrounded by beauty everywhere she cared to look. The blue sea sparkled in front of her, its deep glittering waters revealed clear in the shallows where she sat; her teal-painted toes digging into the heavy sand. Reaching for the tall glass at her side, which she'd half-buried in the wet sand to keep its contents cool, she brought it to her lips and took a long drink. Was this her fourth banana daiquiri or her fifth? Honestly, it could be her tenth because everything aside from the breathtakingly lucid view was fuzzy and distant. This was all she needed – a sight for cried-out eyes and numbness in a glass.

She felt something approaching peace as the ocean lapped at her ankles and filled the holes she'd dug with her toes. She knew the sand would scratch and tarnish the nail polish on her toes but that was a small price to pay for how good it felt to actually _feel_ again. She felt the cool water. She felt the weight of the sand on the tops of her feet. She felt her calf muscles stretching as she wormed her feet deeper still. Since Curtis had performed his miracle she couldn't seem to keep still; being able to move her legs and feet was still new to her and there was a part of her that worried that this ability would be taken away from her again. Felicity took another sip. The cocktail was ridiculously sweet, but the generous helping of ice had watered it down enough so that it was all-too-easy to drink. Another sip followed, then another.

And she wasn't thinking about _him_ at all. Nuh uh. Not going to happen. Well, okay, technically it just did, but that was the last time. Until the next time.

She buried the almost-empty glass back in the makeshift cooler and slid her arms out behind her, anchoring herself semi-upright in the sand. Her head fell to the right and rested against her warmed shoulder. She could smell her sunscreen and she smiled. Was there a more reminiscent smell; she'd always loved it. It reminded her of vacations she'd taken with her two best friends from high school. Her mom was always working and her father was long gone, but she could always rely on Tara and Alex to save her from the stifling desert heat during those long summer breaks. She'd tag along with Alex to her parent's holiday place in Monterey or go with Tara and her family to Laguna Beach or San Diego. She wondered what they were doing now. Tara was probably still teaching math somewhere and Alex was probably doing something amazing. She'd let them go too easily. The three of them had been inseparable in high school – Tara was the sensible one, Alex was the risk-taker and Felicity was…what was she, the brainy good friend with the crazy mom? Speaking of her mom, she really needed to call her tonight. Mmm… She breathed out long and slow. Mmm…she was so deliciously comfortable…and kinda sleepy. The sun felt wonderful on her skin. Star City and Vegas felt like whole lifetimes ago. And that sunny smell…mmm…it was the smell of hot days and balmy nights. It was the scent that clung to her clothes that night when she and Oliver had slept on the beach in Bali. Nope. Enough of that!

She concentrated on her breathing, mimicking the movement of the ocean swirling around her feet – deep and sure, long and slow, in and out. Her mom was right – this was exactly what she needed. She made another mental note, and stored it in that place where you file drunken musings in hopes you'll recall them again, to _definitely_ call her mom when she made it off the beach. She'd tell her that she was right. The words wouldn't even stick in her throat this time.

Once she'd left Oliver at the loft – great, she's doing it again; what's it been, a whole minute since the last time she thought about him– and called for a taxi to take her to Palmer Tech, her next call was to her mom. She needed someone to tell her that she would be okay because honestly, she was unravelling so fast she feared she'd ask the driver to turn around and take her back. Donna answered on the second ring; she never kept Felicity waiting. When she heard the call connect, she had tried to keep her voice steady, controlled, but in uttering a solitary "Hi", she had clearly given the game away. Donna Smoak may not have stuck it out at school long enough to get her high school diploma but she was unfailingly astute and the best reader of people that Felicity had ever met. It was her superpower.

"What's wrong, Felicity?"

"We…Oliver and me. I left, mom. I think we're over."

"Where are you, honey?"

"In a cab. I'm heading into work."

"No, you're not. You're coming here."

"I'm not really up to seeing Captain Lance right now."

"He'll understand. I'm sure he'll give us some space. Baby, come here, 'k?"

"I can't."

"Then I'll come to you. I'm leaving right now, baby."

Felicity knew that tone and she knew she had to act fast or else her mom would do exactly that, and she just couldn't handle seeing her. It had always been that way. When Felicity was most upset she needed to be on her own. No way she was going to repeat past mistakes. Case in point: she was so lonely her first semester at MIT that she'd foolishly told her mom that she was finding it tough to make new friends and that she didn't think her roommate liked her. The very next day, Donna Smoak was knocking at her door, dressed to the nines, and upon seeing her daughter, enveloped her in a tight hug in full view of everyone on her dorm room floor. Yeah. Fun! Okay, so that hug was everything to her in that moment, but it was ultimately counterproductive. Her mom couldn't stay longer than the weekend and as soon as the whirlwind that was Donna Smoak had left, Felicity felt more alone than ever.

"Mom, if I see you, I'll crumble…you _know_ I will…and right now I need to keep it together."

"Okay, then tell me what you need."

"I need you to tell me that I'm going to be okay. I need you tell me that I'm strong, like you."

"Baby girl, you are the strongest person I know. Come on, you manage a bigilleon-dollar company and you're always the smartest damn person in the room. You are kind and honest and good. You'll be fine. Because whatever happened between you and Oliver, if any two people can have a happy ending…"

"What if it can't be fixed?" Felicity cut in. "What if it's broken forever? God, I don't know what to do. I can't think straight."

"He didn't cheat on you, did he? Because if that MAN DARED…"

"No, mom. He didn't cheat. He…he lied to me about something really important."

"And you don't know if you can forgive him."

"He doesn't trust me, not like he should. I can't marry someone whose instinct is always to keep secrets. And now all I keep thinking is that he's like dad and that I should've known better."

"Felicity, Oliver is _nothing_ like your father. Trust me."

"Isn't he? At heart, _isn't_ he? He lied about something that I had every right to know. And if he can do it once, he'll do it again. He doesn't let me in, and it's just like how dad used to be. He always keeps pieces of himself out of reach. I don't think he knows how to be any other way. And, mom, I want more than that. I deserve more than that."

"Have you told him how you feel, or did you just walk out?"

"I told him. And now I just want to be…not here." She couldn't stop the tears then. They were wet and noisy and the only thing that stopped her from losing her mind was the sound of her mom's reaching her, soothing her, down the phone. She listened, cell phone pressed tight to her ear; to her mom telling her that she would survive this all the way to Palmer Tech, and by the time she reached her office and ended the call, they had come up with a plan. This plan. It was only after she'd boarded her flight to St. Lucia that she realised that she'd forgotten to tell her mom that she could walk again. Damn it. She'd be paying for that oversight for years to come.

She HAD to remember to call her mom when she made it back to her room. Felicity, this is important – call mom. Do not forget. Do not forget…mmm…so tired. And thirsty. Her drink was mostly melted ice now; a fruit-speared cocktail umbrella rested against the side of the tall glass and it was an altogether sorrier looking thing than when the stupidly handsome barman had presented it to her. If only she could be bothered to move, she'd walk the short distance to the beach bar and order another. Actually, perhaps it was a blessing that she was suddenly utterly exhausted – she wasn't drunk enough to think she was fine; the cocktails were definitely taking their toll. She rested her back against the sand, now lying flat out, and stretched, languid and oblivious to everyone else on the beach. She felt blissfully alone. Her only company the ocean and the mattress of sand supporting her. Closing her eyes, she adjusted to the red hue caused by the sun's still strong rays and wondered why things felt brighter with her eyes closed.

She couldn't help it, she was quite tipsy, you know: Oliver's face, smiling, full of love for her penetrated the rosy brightness and made her shiver; her eyes snapped open. Damn it! Yeah, she needed to get her ass of this beach and into a shower. Laying here was not helping her mood and offered little in the way of distractions. She'd take a long shower and cover herself in that heavenly body cream they provided in the room. Then she would spend at least half an hour choosing which out of the few outfits she'd purchased at the airport before boarding her flight to wear down to dinner. She could maybe string out perusing the dinner menu for ten minutes before selecting something, and really, it didn't matter what she chose, it was bound to be delicious. Actually, she might see if Rosa was free to join her for dinner and then after play a few rounds of poker with her new friend in the piano bar. See. She had plenty to do. There wasn't even time to think about Oliver. Oh _crap_. She was a lost cause.

~O~

He cherished the feel of the tumbler of scotch in his hand. There had been a moment or two when he doubted if he'd ever again experience the burning sweetness as it slipped down his throat or the comfort of holding a perfectly weighted-bottom glass in his hand. Small things, really. He needn't have second-guessed himself, which was really quite unlike him, because three weeks into his ridiculously long sentence, he strolled out of the Iron Heights and back to a civilisation he recognised.

He ordered a second drink and it was placed on the table next to his high-backed rattan chair just as she walked into the large, plush lobby. He observed her reflection in the gilded mirror hanging on the wall opposite his chair, certain that he could see her without her being able to see him. She looked good. Healthy. Strong again. He could see her mother in her, he supposed – something in the way she held herself – but that was all, thank goodness. He preferred her natural dark hair to the dyed blonde; he wondered if it was her way of being closer to Donna, to home, or simply something women did. Either way, it was irrational.

Taking another sip of scotch, he continued watching as an elderly woman approached Felicity and kissed her on the cheek. The stranger appeared to be wearing a multi-coloured tent. The vast piece of material ballooned at her feet, which were unsuitably bare for a hotel of this calibre, and aside from her head and hands, she was overwhelmed in the vulgar pattern. He was surprised to see Felicity return the kiss. Who was this woman? He'd expected she'd be on her own; this was a potential complication that he didn't need. The two women left the bustling lobby together and walked outside to the large terrace which wrapped around the back of the hotel and which presented guests with an uninterrupted view of the Caribbean Sea. Shortly after, a waiter dressed in starched white trousers and a similarly crisp short-sleeved shirt followed in their path, carrying two glasses of what looked like champagne cocktails on a silver tray. He watched as Felicity accepted the redder of the two drinks. Seeing an easy opportunity open up before him, he stopped the waiter as he made his return trip and enquired what the two women were drinking, saying that his wife was fond of champagne cocktails.

"Good evening, sir. Yes, one of the ladies is drinking a Kir Royale and the other ordered a Barbotage."

"Of course, I've heard of a Kir Royale – that's the one with crème de cassis, isn't it?" He asked, already cognisant of the answer, his eyes again darting to the terrace where Felicity was laughing at something her companion was saying.

"Yes, the younger lady is drinking the Kir Royale. It's a classic. Would Sir like to try one, or perhaps I can order one for your wife."

"Oh no, thank you. My wife is still getting ready, but I'll be sure to order one for her when she makes it down for dinner."

"Well then, can I bring you another?" The waiter nodded at the mostly-full glass on the table.

"Yes, I think I have time for another before dinner and besides, I have this view to admire."

"It's the best on the island, sir."

"Yes. I believe it is."


End file.
